


Falling, Fallen, Fell (Rise Up)

by Shycraft



Category: Books of the Raksura - Martha Wells
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Canon-Typical Violence, Consolation's father lives, Family, Fell-Hybrids (Books of the Raksura), Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Moon I found you some friends, Moon finds Consolation's family before meeting Stone, Moon needs friends, Non-Consensual Touching, bad Fell are bad, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-10-03 20:51:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20459282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shycraft/pseuds/Shycraft
Summary: Things always get worse before they get better.





	Falling, Fallen, Fell (Rise Up)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lastwingedthing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lastwingedthing/gifts).

> Trigger warnings: Implied non-con and references to non-con, but nothing on screen. Some non-consensual touching on screen, but not focused on. Stay safe, friends.
> 
> This is, as is frequently the case, not what I intended to write. Also, my social anxiety said that I wasn’t allowed to contact a beta? I apologize for any fuzziness or inconsistencies. Please let me know if you spot any errors.
> 
> *waves to lastwingedthing* Hello! You have great ideas! Thank you for having such a great prompt! I wanted to write you a novel. This is not a novel, but I hope you like it anyway!

1.

Two of the rulers—he has long since stopped paying attention to their names—he can barely remember his _own_ name, much less keep track of his captors’—enter the little room they’re using as his cell. The consort braces himself. Wonders if they’re here to rape him personally, or if they’re going to bring him to the progenitor again. Can’t decide which option is worse.

Instead, one of them drops a something at his feet. Meat, he realizes, and tries not to look at it too closely. If he closes his eyes, he can pretend it used to be a grasseater, instead of a person.

The second ruler holds out his hands, looking at him expectantly. He’s smiling at him, in that sick, creepy way the Fell have, like he’s their friend instead of their prisoner. When the consort makes no move to stand up, the ruler bends down and drops what he was holding into the consort’s lap. Instinct kicks in before he even realizes what it is, and he picks the tiny thing up and cradles it in his hands.

“The previous ones died,” the ruler says. “You will take care of this one. It will not die.”

And they leave him, locking the door behind themselves, as he stares down in astonishment at the tiny baby they’d left behind.

2.

Consolation’s earliest memories are of the consort bringing her outside, into the good clean air that her half-Raksura body needs to survive. It used to be just the two of them. The Fell would keep the other young ones away from him, as a punishment, but they didn’t dare take her, not when she was young. They’d had too many hybrids die without a Raksura there to raise them.

And so she toddled through long grass and shallow water, while her clutch-father held her hands or cooed over her achievements. He would cuddle with her in warm sunlight, boost her up higher so she could see the shining stars, sing old Raksura nursery rhymes to rock her to sleep. She remembers waving happily at everything, at fish and bugs and birds, at whatever kethel had been sent to watch them.

She hates that, now--hates that there was a time when she’d been too naïve to be afraid.

Later, sometimes, the Fell would let the other children out with them, and she could play with her dakti-brothers and the youngest of the full-blood Fell. Consolation teaches ruler fledglings clapping games that the consort taught her, teaches dakti and kethel how to laugh. They were allowed to run and jump and climb things, flapping their undeveloped wings and pretending to fly, while their consort watched them play with a peaceful smile on his face.

She does not want to know what sacrifices the consort had to make in order to convince the Fell to let him take all of the children outside, instead of just her. She is too afraid that she already knows the answer.

And so she plays with the others, and she hopes that he won’t get any more scars when they go back inside.

3.

Consolation watches the rulers drag her father away and hisses. She pulls her wings tightly around herself, hunching forward. She is young, small, and powerless.

At her side, a shadow moves, and she reaches down to take First’s hand. He works his jaw, making a few false starts before he can get the words out. A dakti’s mouth is not made for speaking. Rulers don’t want the common Fell talking amidst themselves; they don’t want them _thinking_. Far better for them to be dumb and stupid, for their mouths to make words only when under the control of a ruler. They don’t need words of their own.

This is why First is First. He’s still learning the right way to shape his words—but he _is_ learning. And the other lesser Fell—the other dakti, and maybe soon even the kethel—they’re starting to learn, too.

With a few more awkward false starts, First finally says, “They are going to kill him soon.”

“I know.” Consolation hisses again. She knows. She just don’t know what to _do_ about it.

4.

It’s just his luck, really. Moon tells himself that he shouldn’t be shocked. It’s been a long time since Saraseil, and he’s seen so many more cities destroyed since then. Fell seem to be getting more and more common these days. But there’s still something horribly ironic about fleeing from one Fell flight only to be captured by another. The two flights greeted each other with bloodshed and slaughter. It seems they can’t even get along with each other. Moon just got caught in the middle. 

“So pretty,” one of the rulers says, petting his hair. Another wraps pale fingers around Moon’s neck with a pleasant smile, saying, “We love you. We will take good care of you.”

Two of them. He can’t take on two rulers at once. Not like this.

Moon can feel their influence tugging at him, trying to soothe him, to compel him, to lull him into submission. He fights it, but it still smoothes away the edges of his fear. He takes a steadying breath and goes limp in their arms. He tells himself that it will be like it was with Liheas. Like it was in Saraseil. He can do this. He’s done it before. Just let them have their fun, he thinks, and then he’ll be able to flee when their guard is down.

He’s wrong.

5.

A list of things Moon will never know:

He's been fleeing from the same Fell for years. Liheas' kin only give up looking for him after Consolation's progenitor fights them over him. She scatters Liheas' old flight to the winds, and feels nothing but contempt.

A world away, Indigo Cloud's colony, suddenly freed from Fell influence, slowly begins to recover, never knowing why they'd suffered so many turns of bad luck but glad that it seems to be over. A mentor named Chime never has to wake up to find himself changed into a warrior overnight. They move on.

In the Reaches, the half-Fell hybrids of Opal Night wake from a shared nightmare. Moon is too far away for them to know him, to understand why they all feel so uneasy, but his presence ripples through the Fell hive mind. They shudder under the weight of a changed fate. A young consort called Shade curls up in the big queen's lap and can't explain why he can't stop crying. 

6.

When the rulers have finished with him, they throw him in a cell. The building they’ve invaded is made of heavy stone, and its dungeon is dark and damp. He wonders what they’d have done with him if they’d taken over a place without a jail. Kill him?

He has a sick feeling that he’s going to find out; Fell only ever stay in one place until they use up its resources. This isn’t a big city. They won’t be here very long.

When a hand touches his shoulder, Moon thinks it’s another ruler. He flinches, then whirls around and bares his teeth.

“Easy,” the dark shape says. Its voice is softer than any Fell Moon’s ever heard. “Are you injured?”

Moon scuttles backward until he hits the bars of the cell. Pressing back against those unmoving bars, it suddenly occurs to him to wonder why a ruler would be locked in a dungeon.

The person takes a careful step closer, holding its hands out in supplication. “Please, are you hurt? The Fell don’t keep things clean. If you have wounds, they’ll get infected unless treated.” Another step finally takes it into the light from the hallway.

Moon blinks. Blinks again.

Suddenly dizzy, he sinks down to the floor. It’s not a ruler. Black scales, yes. Frills, spines, wings. _Battered_ wings, on a body that is lined with scars. But not a ruler. Except for the obvious signs of old injuries, looking at this person is like looking in a mirror.

“You’re like me,” he whispers, and the stranger kneels down in front of him, his spines tilted with worry.

7.

The older man—the Raksura? The consort? He’d explained what they were several times now, with the patience of someone who is used to being misunderstood, and Moon still can’t believe him. _Raksura_. His head aches. He tries to pay attention.

“They’ll take you to meet her,” the older consort says. He doesn’t say who _she_ is. “But after, they might let us go outside for a bit. I’ll introduce you my clutches.”

Horrified, Moon asks, “They caught your kids, too?”

“No,” he answers. “No, they caught me alone. The children were born later.”

The implications sink in. Moon’s fingers curl into a fist.

8.

The progenitor is worse than any ruler could dream of being.

9.

Consolation flicks her tail back and forth in agitation. Rathis had promised to bring her clutch-father to the nursery when the last of the groundlings were dead. Rathis isn’t nice, even as far as Fell rulers go, but he generally keeps his promises.

The door at the end of the long room opens, and there’s Rathis, hands clamped on the elbows of not just her father, but also a stranger. He shoves them into the room, tells them that he’ll come for them when the sun sets, and locks the door behind him.

Usually, the young ones would all cluster around the consort, demanding his attention. This time, they hang back. There’s never been a stranger before.

“It’s all right,” her clutch-father says. “This is Moon. Moon, these are all of the children,” and he starts to wade through them, placing his hands on heads or shoulders as he says each one’s name.

Moon stays by the door. He’s hugging himself, watching them all warily. His eyes flick to the door and back. He’s afraid, she realizes, and so she goes over and takes his hand. He jumps when she touches him, but she just smiles. “I’m Consolation. That’s my clutch-father.” She points. Maybe he’d be less scared if he knew that she was a Raksura, too.

He stares down at her with wide eyes, edging slightly away from her. Then he straightens his shoulders and meets her gaze. “I’m Moon,” he says. “I… don’t know who my clutch-father is.”

“You can share mine,” she says, because she’s young and it just seems that simple to her. “That makes you another one of my brothers. Come play with us?”

He nods and lets her lead him into the room.

10.

The room they’re using as a nursery is full of soft things. Moon knows the words for all of them, even for ones that the older consort doesn’t. It’s the most fun they’ve had in a while.

Later, just before the sun finishes setting, Consolation sits with her youngest brother, a ruler named Tahanas, and with her new oldest brother, Moon. First is there, too, ever a shadow at her side. Tahanas is sound asleep in his lap.

The older consort is asleep now, too, slumped over on Kethel’s shoulder. Kethel has kept his distance from Moon, who seemed more wary of him than of the smaller Fell. Kethel is younger than Consolation, but he is bigger than she is. Now, he meets her eyes, looking grim. He hasn’t quite mastered speaking just yet, but she doesn’t need that to know what he’s thinking. The consort is getting too thin. She watches him, the ever constant worry digging its claws into her gut.

She must not be hiding it very well, because Moon follows her gaze and then gives her an awkward pat on the back. She doesn’t think he’s used to comforting people.

“He’s going to die,” she says to him. “It’s never clean enough. He’ll get sick. Or they’re going to kill him. I don’t know which.” She hugs her knees to her chest.

“They’re going to kill all of us, eventually,” Moon says. “It’s what the Fell do.”

“No.” Moon jumps when First speaks. The little dakti meets his gaze head on. “We can learn. Be better.”

Moon is silent for a while. He looks around the room, taking in all of the sleeping children. She wonders what he’s remembering. Finally, he clears his throat and says, “Sorry.” It’s hard to tell on his groundling face, but she thinks he still looks scared.

First stares at Consolation. He wants her to do something, but she feels tired and sad. She shakes her head and rests her chin on the top of her knees.

He sighs. He speaks slowly, taking pains to make all of the sounds come out right. “We can’t be better here. They won’t let us.”

Consolation sighs. “We can’t escape,” she whispers. “There’s not enough of us. And we’re still too little.”

“Then don’t fight them head on.” They look at Moon, whose eyes drift to the door again.

She squeezes her eyes shut. “I’ve tried. I’ve made a lot of plans. They just won’t _work_.” Then she opens on eye and peaks at him. “Or… did you have an idea?” Moon knows a lot. Maybe he’s better than her at plans.

Moon face twitches into something almost like a smile. “You really don’t know groundling things very well, do you?”

“No. Even our consort doesn’t know those things.”

“When they brought me to the progenitor,” Moon says, and Consolation winces, “they took me through a bunch of storage rooms. They’ve trashed most of the food already, but groundlings keep a lot of things in rooms like those. Anything they might need later. Fabric. Tools. Old furniture. That sort of thing. And one of those rooms was full of barrels.”

She frowns at him. “What do barrels do?”

“It’s not the barrels. It’s the oil inside them.” The door finally opens, letting in several rulers, trailed by dakti. Moon tenses.

Out of time. Quickly, she grabs his arm and hisses, “And what does oil do?”

Moon’s grin is all teeth. “It burns.”

11.

It is a massacre. On both sides.

The Fell do not notice when Consolation and the other children roll barrel after barrel through the corridors and up to the eves above the grand hall. Or, more likely, they notice, but they do not care. They don’t have the frame of reference to understand the danger.

They do notice when a swarm of tiny dakti split the barrels open and rain oil down upon them. They rise in fury, moving to grab them, and so they definitely don’t notice First, lurking in the doorway, and that is their fatal flaw—refusing to understand that a dakti could _think_, could _disobey_. Before they could realize what's happening, First throws a lit torch into the room.

And they burn.

But the children, there are so very few of them. And they are so, so little.

12.

When they feel the first hint of pain through the Fell connection, Consolation and Kethel jump the ruler who has the keys to the dungeons. It’s not that hard, between the two of them. He’s distracted. He doesn’t see them coming.

(Consolation never knew what _keys_ were before. Moon knows so many things!)

Grabbing the keys, Consolation runs to the door and jams them into the lock. She wasn’t able to practice this before. Moon stands up and talks her through it. When she finally gets the door open, he pulls the old consort to his feet. “Help him,” he says to her. “I’ll clear the path.”

Consolation watches him charge ahead and tries to swallow her fear for him.

13.

Moon kills a dozen dakti, two rulers, and a raging kethel, which is a personal best. They were on fire when he did it, true, but he still feels like it counts.

It’s the progenitor, unsurprisingly, that finally takes him down. She rises out of the flames, so fast that he doesn’t see her coming, and rakes him across the face with her claws. The blow sends him flying across the room. He slams into the far wall, sliding down to the floor. She stalks over to him, lifts him by the throat, and hisses something at him, but he can’t hear her. His body goes limp in her hold as unconsciousness takes him.

14.

In a regular situation, Consolation would never be able to kill her progenitor. She’s still a fledgling, really, still head-and-shoulders smaller than a ruler. Nothing even resembling a match for a Fell progenitor in her prime.

This is not a regular situation. She helps her clutch-father through the halls, killing the adult dakti that try to stop them. The fire is spreading. They have to hurry.

It’s chance, really, that makes her look into the grand hall as they pass it. She looks through the flames, sees the progenitor coming up on Moon, and feels like she’s being torn apart. She has to get her clutch-father out of the building. But none of this would be possible if it weren’t for Moon. And Moon is a consort, too. She has to save him.

The old consort coughs and squeezes her shoulder. “I can make it the rest of the way,” he rasps. “Be strong. Be fast. Be smart. Don’t let her see you until it’s too late for her.”

And so Consolation sneaks into the grand hall, wincing when she has to pass through the flames, hugging the wall until she’s almost at the place where the progenitor holds Moon. She sees him twitch once and go still, and she’s terrified that she’s already too late. But the progenitor is weakened by the fire and smoke, and her full attention is on the consort in her claws. Consolation will never get a chance like this again.

This is how Consolation, still young, still small, somehow manages to leap onto her mother’s back and rip her claws through the progenitor’s throat.

15.

There’s so much blood. So much blood, and everything's on fire, and Consolation is sure Moon is dead, but she grabs him anyway. No leaving consorts behind.

16.

Moon wakes to find Consolation dragging him away from the burning remains of the groundling castle. He tries to get his feet under him and stumbles. The movement must surprise Consolation, because she squeaks and drops him.

“Moon! You’re not dead!”

“Not yet,” he mumbles. He tries to sit up and is mostly successful. He takes stock of his injuries. No broken bones, it looks like, which is good because he’d shifted from winged to groundling form when the progenitor hit him. Hit him in the face, and his face _hurts_. He tries to open his right eye and nothing happens.

Consolation stops him when he reaches a hand up to feel the damage. “I don’t think you should touch it,” she says. Behind them, the roof of the castle collapses. She squeaks again.

“Okay,” he says, and pushes through the nausea. He tries to get to his feet. “Okay. We can’t stay here.”

Consolation ducks under his arm, tugging him so that he leans on her. “I should be carrying you,” she says. “Queens are supposed to take care of consorts.”

“Nobody’s carrying me anywhere,” he grumbles. “Besides, you’re too short.” But he lets her take some of his weight. Slowly and steadily, she guides him to the others.

17.

The old consort sees Consolation and Moon coming up the path. The relief is overpowering. “We’ll go to the Reaches,” the he calls out to them, dazed. “We’ll get a colony tree, Consolation, it will all be all right. Moon, I never thought I’d see it. I thought I was teaching them how to live without me. _Moon_.”

Then he blinks and sees Moon’s face, and the excitement in his eyes fades. “Oh, child,” he says, and cups Moon’s chin, wiping away blood with his sleeve. He rips off the cleanest part of his shirt and makes a hasty bandage. He’s still shaking, still in shock, but he shakes his head, trying to push through the fog. Turning, he sees his poor battered children, and he could _scream_, except that they need him. “Bandages,” he mutters, “We need clean bandages,” and he goes toward the nearest abandoned groundling building with his head held high.

18.

Maybe, if Consolation had been older, it might have been an easier fight. She’d have been evenly matched with the progenitor; more than a match for the rulers and dakti and kethel. Her brothers and their allies would have been bigger, too. It wouldn’t be an easy battle, but maybe they could have made enough of a nuisance of themselves that the flight would let them leave.

If they had done that, the old consort would be dead. Time for her to grow up was time that he didn’t have. And if Moon was still alive when she made her move, she wouldn’t be allowed to take him. She would’ve had to fight. They all might have died anyway.

Their consorts are safe. Consolation repeats it to herself, over and over, as they stand outside, watching the big groundling building burn to the ground. Their consorts are safe. Their consorts are safe.

There’s a footstep behind her, and Consolation turns to see Moon. His head is swathed in bandages that cover one eye. It’s a stark reminder that he might be safe, but he’d hardly come through this unharmed. None of them have.

19.

Consolation falls to the ground, keening. She looks up at Moon, looking young and breakable. “I said I’d get them out, Moon. I promised. There’s barely any of us left.”

Moon looks around at their sorry little group with his good eye. The old consort, sunk into exhausted sleep. Consolation. Four rulers, one of whom is small enough to hold in his arms; the others aren’t that much bigger. A handful of dakti, looking scared and confused, intermingled with the half dozen hybrid dakti who’d survived. Two kethels. And Moon himself.

Everyone is burned and bloodied. Everyone is covered in grief.

She’d insisted he was her brother. Moon remembers a tree, a long time ago, curled up with his brothers and sister, Sorrow watching over them. He looks at their little group again.

He is scared and confused and in pain. He is free. He’s not alone anymore. He doesn’t know how to handle it.

He thinks he’s starting to bleed through his bandage. And he’s hungry, now that he thinks of it. Exhausted.

But he’s alive. And thinking of Fern and the others hurts more than anything, more than the burns or the gashes on his face, but it might be nice to have siblings again. He could try, at least. Teach them how to survive. He’s good at that part. Clearing his throat, he points to a sky-island, floating high above them, and says, “There’s probably ruins up there. Good places to sleep, nothing to sneak up on us, and no groundlings to deal with. Can everyone manage the flight?”

The two surviving kethel look at each other, then at the sky island. They nod. First says, “They will carry anyone who can’t.”

Moon nods and shifts, spreading his wings.

20.

If anyone had told Moon, ten turns ago, last week, _yesterday_, that he would someday think of any Fell with anything less than revulsion, he would have laughed bitterly and left them for a fool. But here he is, cradling a sleepy fledgling ruler on his lap on a flying island, teaching dakti to make flower crowns. Fell are not used to _making_ things, and dakti claws are not as nimble as a Raksura’s. But they’re learning.

Consolation steps out of the ruins and approaches them. Moon cocks his head at her. “Is he sleeping?”

“Yes.” She sits down carefully next to him. “Moon. Is he sick?”

Moon has no idea. He picks another flower and hands it to a dakti child, who chirps in thanks. “I think he’s tired,” he finally says, and knows that that’s true. If they’re very lucky, it’s the whole truth.

Consolation sighs and lies down in the grass. “Will you teach us how to take care of him?”

“Yes,” says Moon, and that _is_ the truth. “We’ll figure it out.”

The little progenitor-queen nods, turning her head to look at the ruler fledgling. “Shouldn’t Tahanas be sleeping, too? He always told me, little ones need lots of sleep.”

The fledgling stirs at the sound of its name, blinking at her sleepily. “Don’t want to be Tahanas,” he mumbles. “Want a Raksura name.”

“We’ll get you a Raksura name,” Moon tells him, running fingers through his soft baby hair.

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Appeased, he tucks his head under Moon’s chin and falls back asleep. Shrugging, Moon looks back at Consolation. “It’s a special night. Everyone gets to stay up late on special nights.”

“I’ve never had one of those before,” she says. She looks around at the dakti, then back to Moon. “What are you all doing?”

“Nothing much. Making flower crowns.” At her confused look, he adds, “They’re like hats. You put them on your head. Here, like this.” He takes his finished crown and drapes it around Consolation’s frills.

She lifts one hand up, brushing the flowers with the tips of her claws. “Why?”

Because it was the most frivolous thing Moon could think of. Because he needed something to do with his hands or he’d feel useless. Because a little groundling girl taught him how to do this, long ago. “Because it’s fun.”

Consolation picks a flower, looking at him with determination, and says, “Show me.”


End file.
